tmonkey

Shades of Maldini there.

Danny Simpson runs the ball out of play.

No suprise to see Keita loose the ball straight away.

Pacman...

If we hadn't resorted to 20 minutes of hopeless hoofball in between the 2nd and 3rd goal, that would have been a perfect first half. We must have won about 1 out of 30 hoofs.

Woy Face Wub.

Simpson wasn't part of the So Solid Crew there.

Ben Arfa > Messi.

He's played 3 good passes in the opening 5 minutes. Maybe he's a better footballer in this CM role with more options around him?

Ben Arfa on the left wing

Needs to perform impressively for Argentina in a World Cup to undeniably rank #1 - doesn't have to "win" a World Cup single handedly, though it'd help. Just needs to run the show and look as immense as he does for Barca (most of the time - still think Iniesta tends to stand out more in the big CL games). It's not a difficult concept to understand - he'll be the best player ever if he's able to replicate his club form on the international stage. Why? Because that's what the players he's being compared to have done in the past. And for me, international football, specifically the latter stages of the World Cup, is easily the highest level in the sport. The pressure is higher, the dream of winning is bigger (increased effort and motivation), the window to perform is smaller (don't get to wipe the slate clean every year), the good teams are seemingly better organised with greater depth and fewer weaknesses (no budget limitations), the best attacking players are marked tighter and crowded out more, etc etc. If a player is in peak form for his club, and has been for years, then goes into a major international tournament like the World Cup and performs poorly, then it's difficult to not count this against him. Raul would be a prime example of this...

I vividly remember the peak Keegan era defence being dogshit compared to what Arsenal and ManU had, and nothing will change that opinion, be it the labelling of said opinion as being based on myths or statistics that "prove" the opinion to be wrong. Why? Because based on what I recall seeing with my own eyes, collectively we were nowhere near as solid/dominating a defensive unit as ManU/Arsenal were, and individually we were, to a man, significantly inferior (imo of course). IIRC Arsenal had Seaman, Dixon, Adams, Bould/Keown, Winterburn, ManU had Schmeical, Parker/Neville, Bruce, Pallister, Irwin, and we had Hislop, Barton, Howey/Peacock, Albert, Beresford. Whilst it might be easy to remember our group of defenders having good games, Albert marauding forward like a gazelle with silky smooth ball control, etc etc, there's absolutely no way in hell any of our defenders were on a par defensively with their Arsenal and ManU counterparts, not in terms of defensively ability. That's not to say they were bad or they weren't decent/good players in their own right, just that they weren't as good, much like Shaka Hislop wasn't a bad keeper but wasn't anything like as good as Seaman or Schmeical (and on that note, is anyone going to argue otherwise, since the same set of stats could be used here to argue that Hislop was, infact, only marginally inferior to one of the best keepers in the modern era? Or is that not a myth because...noone can be arsed calling it a myth?). I'd argue that under Keegan, we had a defence that was upper-mid-table standard, as opposed to title challenging standard - similar to the defence we had when we qualified for the CL under Sir Bobby (Dabizas, O'Brien, Bramble, Hughes, etc etc). The biggest problem was the lack of a leader at the back, be it a verbal one or someone who lead by example. Someone like Woodgate or Coloccini would have been a massive boost to the Keegan era backline, and it's something the other teams had in their respective defences (even Blackburn with Hendry). And although I don't get how anyone can see it any differently, I'm not going to belittle their opinion by claiming it's based on media myths, stereotypes or fairytales.

Rooney

Some orgasmic commentating made that bit of skill even better.

http://www.billrini.com/wp-content/uploads/comical_ali.jpg "We don't play hoofball".

Messi being a prick, got his record now losing the ball on purpose.

Tello told them.

Tello is shit.

L1 to slow dribble and cut inside, R1 + moderately tap shoot to side foot it into the net.

I'm not too averse to us selling him in the summer, providing we get an upgrade. Someone like Arjen Robben will do - similar raw ability level as Ben Arfa imo (great close control, change of direction, unpredictability, deceptively good shooting technique), but far more consistency, and because he's well developed and experienced he knows when/when not to dribble (which arguably is Ben Arfa's biggest flaw). Of course we could give Ben Arfa the time to develop into a world class player simply by ironing out that one flaw of trying too much too often, but that's pointless when we could easily go out and get a better player like Robben.

Justice for the Suarez.

Cunts.

Nice display of his FIFA 5 star skills.

Nice boots.

Jonas right wing, Ben Arfa left wing, Tiote and Cabaye in the middle. That midfield should pick itself, and there's absolutely no justifiable reason why any other lineup should be tried until this one has failed. Ben Arfa and Jonas being on the "correct" flanks would give them the option of putting first time crosses in, whereas if they're on the opposite flank they're constantly checking back in onto their stronger foot and therefore wasting whatever space/crossing opportunity they've created (hence why it becomes tempting to then go for goal instead of putting it into the box). As it stands, with Santon and Jonas always looking to cut back inside and Obertan/Raylor/Simpson doing sod all down the right, we have virtually nothing resembling "service" coming in from the flanks - which in a direct team with two strikers waiting in the box is criminal.